Polish parliament approves moving its work online during coronavirus crisis

The lower house of Poland’s parliament resumed work today for the first time in over three weeks. It met in order to debate and vote on amending parliamentary procedures to allow legislative work to be conducted remotely due to the coronavirus epidemic.

Several MPs decided not to attend the session, citing health concerns. Most of those who did participate wore protective clothing such as masks and gloves.

The proposals were accepted in an evening vote, but only after a dispute over whether the session should have been held at all.

On Tuesday, the Presidium of the Sejm, consisting of the speaker, Elżbieta Witek, and five deputy speakers, recommended that the procedural changes, which would include temporarily allowing online voting, should themselves be approved online.

The European Parliament adopted similar measures for today’s plenary session, with member states agreeing to temporarily allow electronic voting by email until 31 July.

Yet in Poland’s case, the idea of having an online vote about introducing online voting was opposed by Civic Platform (PO), the main centrist opposition, and the far-right Confederation. They argued that it would violate both parliamentary procedure and the constitution, and could therefore invalidate all legislation passed thereafter.

Today’s session thus went ahead, but with a number of additional safety precautions, including MPs being spread out between various rooms in the parliamentary complex and very few present in the main chamber.

Even so, up to a third of MPs from some parties did not show, citing health concerns, reported Onet. The Left party said 10-15 of its 49 MPs would be absent, as they have previously either had cancer, undergone chemotherapy, or have partners who are unwell.

Also missing was a number of MPs from the agrarian Polish People’s Party (PSL), which opposed holding the session today. Two members of the grouping are currently in quarantine, while several others who are either “elderly or suffering from chronic illnesses” will also stay home, said the party’s spokesman.

Two MPs from the ruling Law and Justice (PiS) caucus – Michał Woś, the environment minister, and Edward Siarka – were diagnosed with the coronavirus last week. Agriculture minister Jan Krzysztof Ardanowski has also been put in quarantine after his deputy tested positive for the virus. A number of PiS MPs are being asked to stay home.

By contrast, PO, which pushed for today’s session, encouraged its MPs to turn up to the vote. The party’s leader, Borys Budka, defended its stance by saying that the legislature cannot “work outside the law” just because “someone is scared of showing up to work”, reported Onet.

Speaking to TV channel Polsat, Budka criticised MPs from PiS, the Left and PSL for prioritising “their own comfort and safety” and thereby “placing themselves above regular people who every day work in shops, factories, government buildings”, reported wPolityce.pl.

Meanwhile Warsaw’s mayor Rafał Trzaskowski called into question the security and reliability of remote parliamentary meetings, after he was mistakenly emailed login details for the online session despite not having been an MP since 2018.

Confederation MP Michał Urbaniak, whose login details had been incorrectly sent to Trzaskowski, subsequently wrote on Twitter that the Sejm’s chancellery had assured him that they will not be henceforth sending out full login details in a single text message.

Eventually, just after 7pm, a vote was held in which 41 MPs were present in the main chamber, divided proportionally among the parties. Other MPs voted from separate rooms, with no more than 50 people in each. The session had to be temporarily halted at one stage due to a technical malfunction in one of the rooms, reported RMF FM.

In total, 368 of the Sejm’s 460 MPs voted. A majority of 250 approved allowing remote voting to be added to parliamentary rules, while 104 were opposed and 14 abstained.

The new parliamentary procedures are seen as vital to allow discussion and voting tomorrow on the government’s multi-billion economic support package to help shelter workers and businesses from the economic fallout caused by the coronavirus. The package was unveiled last week and given final approval by the government today, ready for parliamentary approval.

Maria Wilczek is deputy editor of Notes from Poland. She also contributes regularly to The Economist and Al Jazeera, and has also written for The Times, Politico Europe, The Spectator and Gazeta Wyborcza.

Topics

Follow us

Agnieszka Wądołowska

managing editor

Agnieszka Wądołowska is managing editor of Notes from Poland. She has previously worked for Gazeta.pl and Tokfm.pl and contributed to Gazeta Wyborcza, Wysokie Obcasy, Duży Format, Midrasz and Kultura Liberalna.

Percy Metcalfe

contributing editorial assistant

Percy Metcalfe is an American Fulbright student located in Warsaw for the academic year of 2019/20. He is carrying out a research project on the performance of national identity in the Polish-U.S. bilateral relationship at the University of Warsaw while also working part time for Notes from Poland.

Juliette Bretan

contributing writer

Juliette Bretan is a freelance journalist covering Polish and Eastern European current affairs and culture. Her work has featured on the BBC World Service, and in CityMetric, The Independent, Ozy, New Eastern Europe and Culture.pl.

Daniel Tilles

editor-in-chief

Daniel Tilles is editor-in-chief of Notes from Poland and assistant professor of history at the Pedagogical University of Krakow. He has written on Polish affairs for a wide range of publications, including Foreign Policy, POLITICO Europe, The Independent and Dziennik Gazeta Prawna.

Stanley Bill

founder, editor-at-large

Stanley Bill is the founder and editor-at-large of Notes from Poland.He is also Senior Lecturer in Polish Studies and Director of the Polish Studies Programme at the University of Cambridge, where he works on Polish culture, politics and history.

Stanley has spent more than ten years living in Poland, mostly based in Kraków and Bielsko-Biała. He founded Notes from Poland in 2014 as a blog dedicated to personal impressions, cultural analysis and political commentary. He is committed to the promotion of deeper knowledge and understanding of Poland.

Makana Eyre

author

Makana Eyre is a freelance journalist based in Paris. He covers politics and has written for The Nation, The Guardian, Foreign Policy, and others. He is a graduate of the Columbia Journalism School where he was a fellow at the Stabile Center for Investigative Journalism.

Maria Wilczek

deputy editor

Maria Wilczek is deputy editor of Notes from Poland. She also contributes regularly to The Economist and Al Jazeera, and has also written for The Times, Politico Europe, The Spectator and Gazeta Wyborcza. She was previously Marjorie Deane fellow at The Economist in London (2018) and a business consultant at the Boston Consulting Group in Warsaw. Maria is a graduate of the University of Oxford and a student at the Polish School of Literary Reportage.

Olga Tokarczuk

Sioban Doucette

author

Siobhan Doucette is a historian whose work focuses the opposition movement in Communist Poland. Her first book, Books Are Weapons: The Polish Opposition Press and the Overthrow of Communism, is available from University of Pittsburgh Press. It focuses on the Polish independent publishing movement from 1976 to 1989.